NEW YORK (Jan. 28, 2016) – SHOWTIME Sports® is commemorating 30 years of SHOWTIME CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING with a year-long celebration that will highlight the biggest, most memorable and exciting SHOWTIME fights spanning four decades.
The network’s flagship sports series, SHOWTIME CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING, was born on March 10, 1986 when “Marvelous” Marvin Hagler defeated John “The Beast” Mugabi by spectacular 11th-round knockout. Since then, the series has distinguished itself as the premium television destination for boxing’s brightest stars and countless significant events in the storied history of the sweet science.
In celebration, SHOWTIME will go deep into its archive to reprise classic fights, grouping them together by a common theme each month. A new fight, each one wrapped with brief context and commentary from one of the network’s boxing experts, replays every “Throwback Thursday” night on SHOWTIME EXTREME throughout 2016. While Thursday night is the viewer’s destination for the initial replay of the classics, all the bouts for that month are available on SHOWTIME ON DEMAND®, SHOWTIME ANYTIME® and via the network’s online streaming service. Plus, on the last Saturday of the month, a programming block including all of that month’s classics will air concurrently on SHOWTIME EXTREME.
The month of January has been dedicated to Undisputed Heavyweight Champion Evander Holyfield and his Hall of Fame career. Thus far, SHOWTIME has presented a compilation from Holyfield’s cruiserweight career, plus Holyfield vs. Michael Dokes and Holyfield vs. Buster Douglas in entirety with both extraordinary Holyfield vs. Mike Tyson bouts airing tonight at (10 p.m. ET/PT, SHO EXTREME).
Each month’s live SHOWTIME CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING event will include a segment in support of the 30th anniversary retrospective. Segments will include a vintage feature or a special guest which will connect the greats of the past to the modern era and that night’s main event.
Digital support each month will include short form, high-impact video components—complete rounds, highlights, exclusive interviews with the biggest stars and historic perspective from the personalities that color the rich history of boxing on SHOWTIME. Examples of the short-form content for January’s celebration of Holyfield are as follows:
Exclusive Interviews: “Evander Holyfield Reflections” is a series of digital shorts cut from a recent interview. Watch this clip as Holyfield remembers his 1997 rematch with Mike Tyson: http://s.sho.com/1nPcElI
Full Rounds: Tyson vs. Holyfield 1 | Round 11: http://s.sho.com/1nL4w5K
Bonus Features: Holyfield vs. Tyson 2: http://s.sho.com/23ttJ5g
Social Content: Douglas vs. Holyfield | Collision Course: http://s.sho.com/1nPwIEC
For much more, visit SHOWTIME Sports Channel on YouTube and SHOWTIME Boxing on Facebook or @ShoSports on Twitter.
Coming in February, SHOWTIME will celebrate its greatest “Rivalries.” Classic bouts for the month include Johnny Tapia vs. Paulie Ayala I and II, as well as the incredible trilogy between super bantamweight champions Israel Vazquez and Rafael Marquez. (A programming alert with precise dates and times is forthcoming.)
Other themes to be assigned to the months that follow include “Mike Tyson,” “Fights of the Year,” “Julio Cesar Chavez,” “Puerto Rican Stars,” “Upsets,” and “Floyd Mayweather.”
The celebratory campaign culminates at year’s end with a fans’ vote for the greatest knockouts in SHOWTIME CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING history.
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Showtime Networks Inc. (SNI), a wholly-owned subsidiary of CBS Corporation, owns and operates the premium television networks SHOWTIME®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ and FLIX®, and also offers SHOWTIME ON DEMAND®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ ON DEMAND and FLIX ON DEMAND®, and the network’s authentication service SHOWTIME ANYTIME®. Showtime Digital Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of SNI, operates the stand-alone streaming service SHOWTIME®. SHOWTIME is currently available to subscribers via cable, DBS and telco providers, and as a stand-alone streaming service through Apple®, Roku®, Amazon and Google. Consumers can also subscribe to SHOWTIME via Hulu, Sony PlayStation® Vue and Amazon Prime Video. SNI also manages Smithsonian Networks™, a joint venture between SNI and the Smithsonian Institution, which offers Smithsonian Channel™, and Smithsonian Earth™ through SN Digital LLC. SNI markets and distributes sports and entertainment events for exhibition to subscribers on a pay-per-view basis through SHOWTIME PPV. For more information, go to www.SHO.com.
